Greater Manchester Fire and Rescue sent 12 appliances to deal with the blaze, which began at about 16:00 GMT.

The eighth floor of the building – which adjoins a 20-storey block – suffered smoke damage, while floors 10 and 11 were affected externally.

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Media captionPeople inside the block of flats captured the blaze as it started to take hold

Shoppers watched as crews dealt with the fire. Witness Les Gunn said there had been “lots of smoke and debris”.

Mark Denby, who had been in a nearby cafe, said: “There were groups of people congregating on street corners looking up at a tower block and I saw… flames licking up the side of the building.

“It was pretty horrifying.”

‘Heroic job’

He said engines had arrived “in quick succession” and people applauded firefighters for “doing a heroic job”.

Andrew Hirst, 36, said cheering could be heard as they put out the blaze.

He said: “You could hear the crowd’s cheers as it was going down and you could see the torches from the firemen searching the burned out apartments right next door to the other apartments that were still frighteningly ablaze.”

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Image caption
The fire was in a block near the Manchester Arndale Centre

Earlier the fire service tweeted: “The fire had spread to multiple floors but we have things well under control here.”

It said emergency services, including police and paramedics, had done an “amazing job”.

Manchester Central MP Lucy Powell tweeted that the building was “safely evacuated”.

BBC Sport journalist Saj Chowdhury, who was near the scene, said the fire was “doused quite quickly”.

Joiner Street continues to be closed to traffic, police said.

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Eyewitnesses said onlookers applauded as the fire was extinguished